Cogewea, the Half-Blood

break from the corral erected about us we meet up with trouble. I only wish that the fence could not be scaled by the soulless creatures who have ever preyed upon us.”

“I wish I had a killed that there da⁠—”

“Don’t Jim! Do not refer to the past! It never was! It’s only an impossible fearfulness! a dreadful hallucination! a nightmare of lies! It is dead! buried and forgotten!”

Cogewea’s countenance had changed to something of her former self. Jim thought that she never had appeared quite so beautiful and captivating. For a time he was silent and then exclaimed earnestly:

“Sis! I always did love you some, and now I like you like hell! S’pose we remain together in that there corral you spoke of as bein’ built ’round us by the Shoyahpee? I ain’t never had no ropes on no gal but you.”

“Aw! Jim, quit yo’ kiddin’!” she answered, dropping into the easy vocabulary of the range. “I’ve tol’ yo’ that I would be yo’ sister; but if yo’ don’t behave I’ll quit likin’ yo’ as⁠—as a brother! Savey?”

There was a banter in her tone which Jim could not mistake.

“Yes! I think I savey all right!” and he slipped an arm about the yielding form. “By gollies! little squ⁠—Sis! Oh! hell! That there don’t sound right to me no more. I⁠—”

“Call me Cogewea! your own little Cogewea!” she exclaimed, nestling her head on his deep chest like a weary child.

For a long minute the transported Westerner held the girl closely and in silence. Then releasing her, he said simply:

“Guess we better be hittin’ the trail! It’s late and night’s goin’ be chilly for you without no shawl.”

“Do not hurry! See how magnificent those grand old mountains are in the moonlight. Isn’t this a splendid world?”

“Yes! it is jus’ ’bout right⁠—when not too cold nor too hot⁠—nor nothin’ wrong with the corral fencin’. But the best rider of the Flathead ain’t a worryin’ ’bout this durn’ old world no more! And I sure do b’lieve in them there hot rock signs of the sweat-house!”

“So do I!” laughed Cogewea, feeling the blood suffuse her cheeks. “But do let up on that ‘best rider’ stunt. Maybe you will not want to ride any more, only for fun. I forgot to tell you all that is in this letter. It transpired that owing to a technical flaw in daddy’s will, we girls come in for a share in some of his fortune, amounting to a quarter million dollars each. And say! Jim! Stemteemä will now let me have that brooch, I told you I would wear.”

“Well! I bedam’!” ejaculated Jim, as they turned to go.

Cogewea paused, gazing intensely at the grey skull⁠—listening! She heard the Voice as it comes only to the Indian:

“The Man! The Man! The Man!”

The moon, sailing over the embattled Rockies, appeared to smile down on the dusky lovers, despite the ugly Swa-lah-kin clinging to his face.

---

In a cheap boarding house in an eastern city a few weeks later, a young man with a selfish mouth, suddenly turned pale as he read in a western paper an account of the settling of the great McDonald mining estate in Alaska, and the marriage of his two half-blood daughters. One of them a graduate of Carlisle, to the “Best Rider of the Flathead,” also a half-blood. The younger daughter known as the “Shy girl,” had departed with her husband, Eugene LaFleur, a polished and wealthy Parisian scholar, on a honeymoon tour of Europe.

The trail’s a lane! the trail’s a lane!
Dead is the branding fire.
The Prairies wild are tame and mild,
All close-corraled with wire.

Badger Clark

Endnotes

1. Sne-nah: “owl-woman” of the Okanogans and Tah-tah-kléah of the Yakimas are in the same category. Of the many people devouring monsters, this old woman with her great shoulder basket in which she carries off victims⁠—preferably children⁠—to be cooked or broiled alive and eaten in her remote cavernous den, is the most to be dreaded. I have seen the most refractory Indian child subdued by the mere allusion to her name. This tradition, along with others mentioned in the course of this volume, will be given in full in works now under way by the author of Cogewea and the writer of this note. ↩

2. Wanawish: denoting “water-rapids.” While this name is properly Yakima, it is not inappropriate, for in the first part of it is found the appellation for “river” as spoken by many of the kindred Columbia River tribes. ↩

3. Stemteemä: Okanogan for “grandmother.” ↩

4. Okanogan for rattlesnake is: Hwă-hwă-ulăh; or Hăh-ăh-lăwh. The rendition varies, such as: “evil” or “wicked-crawler”; “evil of the earth”; “evil spirit of the earth”; with perhaps other forms of interpretations. The reptile is held in reverential dread by all the Columbia River tribes. It is only in the direst straits that the tribesmen will molest or injure any of them. They are averse to speaking traversely about them; but on the other hand are prone to condone and make excuse for their dangerous nature. When the Indians are in the hills digging roots in the spring time, it is not uncommon for the rattler to crawl into the teepees and seek the warmth of the bedding. Ofttimes one will ensconce itself at the head of the sleeper. When this occurs, the Indian will carefully gather the intruder on a stick and carry it away, speaking to it something like this:

   “Grandmother! do not come here. I might not see you and step on you. This would hurt you. I do not want to hurt you, my grandmother. Stay out here among the rocks where the sun will soon make you warm. Do not come where I am living, where I am sleeping. I will not stay here long and we must be friends; my grandmother.”

   I have yet to see an Indian